Registered rights such as patents, trademarks, utility models, and design rights are highly relevant for companies. Other crucial knowledge, such as production processes, unique techniques, recipes, calculation documents, and customer or supplier contacts, may qualify as protectable trade secrets. Companies should carefully evaluate which elements of their operations are significant and require trade secret protection.

Trade secrets, as legally defined, are information that is not generally known or readily accessible to individuals who deal with such types of information.

Trade secrets need stricter safeguarding

The German Trade Secrets Act (GeschGehG), effective from April 26, 2019, imposes stricter requirements for securing trade secrets. They must be appropriately safeguarded and not readily accessible.

It is no longer sufficient to merely claim that a trade secret has been violated. Especially in scenarios like initiating business relationships or collaborations for product development, companies often must reveal internal information that qualifies as trade secrets.

Non-Disclosure Agreements

In practice, confidentiality agreements, or Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs), are used to protect trade secrets. A group of corporate lawyers and members of the German Chamber of Commerce and Industry's legal committee has proposed contractual arrangements for this purpose.

Template for a "Non-Disclosure Agreement"

The resulting template for a "Non-Disclosure Agreement", which does not replace specific legal advice, serves as a drafting and checklist tool. It includes prototype and sample creation and extends beyond the trade secret definition in GeschGehG.

Trade Secret Contract Information (English) (PDF, 175 KB)